Brad Marley's Blog

Revenge of the Weekly Grab Bag of Links - 10.31.09

You probably think I have a ton of links saved up since I haven't posted a weekly grab bag of links since early September, right?

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but your thinking would be incorrect.

Truth is, work and baby preparation have gotten in the way of reading.

But with a week of little-to-no sleep on the horizon, I should have more time than I need to stay current on my blog reader.

For now, these will have to do.

• You don't mess with Montana's Communications students (Deadspin) - When Montana's football coach told his players to stop talking to reporters from the student newspaper, the student newspaper relatiated by covering the team's opponents. The coach has since allowed players to talk to the paper. Communications students 1, jocks 0.

• 5 Social Media Disasters (Penn Olson) - The headline says it all, really. Learn how Honda and Taco Bell handled social media the wrong way.

• An Epidemic of Fear: How Panicked Parents Skipping Shots Endangers Us All (Wired Magazine) - This is an article every parent-to-be should read. The topic of vaccinating your kids is polarizing, to be sure, but when the facts are laid out in a straightforward fashion, it's easier to make a decision.

• The Robots Are Coming! Oh, They're Here (Media Decoder Blog - NYTimes.com) - A group of students at Northwestern University have created a bot that writes game recaps that "captures the overall dynamics of the game" using stats from the game. It's called Stats Monkey, and I'm wondering if they set out with the intention to eliminate more jobs.

• Inside the NHL's social media innovations, growing pains (Puck Daddy) - This article explains how the NHL is actively trying to engage its fans (and fans-to-be) on social networking sites.

As always, you can see all of my links on my Delicious page.

How to Win at Public Relations: Drive a Sh*tload of Coverage

This is part one in a never-ending series on how to win at public relations.

While scientists still don't agree on the exact number that constitutes a sh*tload, it's safe to say it's north of "a lot." [Editor's Note: If I may make an apt comparison, wouldn't we all want a sh*tload of money?]

When I began my career a little more than four years ago, a colleague of mine gave me a piece of advice that stuck in my head: public relations is a business based on tangible results.

If you don't deliver those results, you will not succeed.

And in that regard, public relations is like a game. The player with the most coverage wins. The player who doesn't come through consistently is usually sent down to the minor leagues.  And since there is no minor league in public relations, well, you see where I'm going with this.

'Course, there are exceptions.  Some of us take on more strategic roles as we advance through the ranks; others might decide to go down the writing path, focusing on creating the materials that help drive those golden wins.

But if you are responsible for the media relations aspect of your account work, the goal is to fill your client's inbox with coverage recaps. This will also allow your client to recognize your name, which definitely doesn't suck. 

If you're just starting out in a PR career and are looking to win, drive as much coverage as humanly possible.  Don't allow yourself to get lost in the minutiae that can become a distracting part of the job.  Pick up the phone and call that reporter or send that pitch e-mail, because we are paid to get positive coverage in the media. (And journalists don't bite!) 

Whether it's blogs, business journals or broadcast television, the best way to prove how awesome you are is to show how many times your name appears in the coverage tracker.

Seeing your client's story in print is the best feeling you can have in a cubicle, and it's why we get out of bed in the morning.

If you do this better than everybody else, you will win.

It's pretty simple.

Coming Soon: How To Win At Public Relations

People are almost always never asking me: "Brad, how do I win at public relations."

Easy.

Respect it and work hard.

I'm amazed by just how many people fail at this craft on a daily basis. It seems we always hear stories about PR people who think they're bigger than the game.

Just a few days ago, for instance, I read a blog entry on Deadspin about a cable company PR representative masquerading as a "mole" who had some dirt on a group called the "Sports Fans Coalition" that he claimed was run by satellite providers -- the cable company's competitor -- looking to manipulate American sports fans.

He did eventually admit he was a PR rep, but not before trying to sell an exclusive story to the site.

And we wonder why journalists don't always care for us.

So, since this is my blog and I work in public relations, I'm starting a semi-regular blog series called "How To Win At Public Relations." I encourage you to follow along.

It's going to be epic win, as the kids say.

Books I Love: In Cold Blood

 

In 1959, two ex-convicts traveled to Kansas for what they were led to believe was an easy score.

According to one of their former cell mates, a wealthy farmer from Kansas hid a large amount of cash on his property, and it was ripe for the picking.

The plan was simple: steal the cash, kill the family, and escape to Mexico. But only two parts of the plan came to fruition. They never found any money.

A brief about the unsolved murders in The New York Times captured enough of author Truman Capote's attention to cause him to convince fellow author Harper Lee to accompany him to Kansas so he could write about the crime before any arrests had been made. He spent six years on it -- including interviews with the suspects -- before it was published in four parts by The New Yorker.

Six years. That's equivalent to six decades in today's tweet-it-before-you-prove-it news cycle.

If Capote spent six years on a story today, the publisher would laugh him out of the building when he turned in his manuscript.

But Capote worked in a time when there wasn't as much urgency; you could let a story simmer before serving it to the public. You could make sure every word was accurate without somebody breathing down your neck to throw up something half-assed because they didn't want to be the last to file the report.

Obviously, those days are history, which makes this book somewhat of a recent relic.

I highly recommend it.

To Retweet or Leave a Comment?

It's the dilemma facing hundreds, if not thousands, of people today.

Do I retweet a great post? Or, do I leave a comment? (I won't introduce the third option, which is leaving a comment on the blogger's Facebook page.)

From a blogger who's been at this for eight months point-of-view, comments lend legitimacy to the blog, but retweets potentially introduce your name to a wider audience.

It's a conundrum to be considered, for sure.

Try not to lose too much sleep over this.

Why We Need News: The Case of Cameron Todd Willingham

I don't want it to seem like I despise the media, because I don't.

While I stay away from the shows that lean decidedly one way or another, I do like watching Anderson Cooper present his subject matter in a way that allows the viewer to draw their own conclusion.

For instance, if you watched last night's report on the execution of Cameron Todd Willingham, you would conclude that Willingham's defense lawyer, David Martin, was, quite possibly, drunk.

With his cowboy hat sitting askew atop his head, Martin tiptoed around Cooper's questions regarding the idea that his ex-client might have been innocent, using words like "absurd" and "absurd" again to refute the preposterousness of such a claim. He challenged the investigative reporter from the Chicago Tribune(who was participating in the discussion) to name the names of the experts who said the arson investigation was faulty, then simply let out an "pssssh" when he was given the names of the experts who disagreed with his take on the trial.

If you're not familiar with this story, Cameron Todd Willingham was sentenced to die by lethal injection after he was found guilty of killing his children by setting his north Texas home ablaze on a December night in 1991. The trial lasted all of two days and the jury delivered a verdict in less than one hour.  (You can read the entire story here. I suggest you do.)

There was always a question of whether or not he really was guilty, but the evidence presented at the time was enough to put him on death row.

Since his death in 2004, fire forensic investigators have updated their procedures. Some of the science behind arson investigation presented at his trial has since been cast off as outdated.

That brings us to last night.

This story is back in the news because Texas Governor Richard Perry recently disbanded a Forensic Commission slated to publicly accept a report by nationally recognized fire expert Craig Beyler that questioned every single piece of evidence of the case. In an election campaign, there are some who question Perry's motives.

Martin, who was tasked with defending Willingham during his trial, was adamant during his interview that Willingham was justifiably handed the death penalty, but he acted like a fool on national television.

A fool who's too headstrong to realize he may have sent an innocent man to his death.

A Story Full of Hot Air

Wouldn't it make things a lot easier on the media if, like Sunday morning golfers, they got mulligans when they erred?

If that do-over was in place, here's how the headline would have read for today's breaking news event:

Empty hot-air balloon floats harmlessly over Denver skyline; absolutely no one harmed

At the very least, it would make the news more accurate.

The national media demonstrated again today why they struggle to earn our trust when they led us to believe a six-year-old boy was stuck helplessly in his father's homemade weather chaser, headed for certain injury, until the balloon crashed and we discovered the basket was empty.

Oops. 

Did anybody think to search the house before, you know, breaking into daytime soap operas across the country? Or is it now sufficient to accept the word of parents who once traded each other in for a different model?

This is the problem with 24/7 news. They tend to make things news that never should have been made news in the first place because they have the time, so we become desensitized to the important stuff.

Nowadays it takes a story of epic proportions to rattle us out of our talking head-induced daze. We would rather watch television shows about women with pickle cravings who -- surprise! -- didn't know they were pregnant, or arguing parents with eight kids, because they are more believable than Wolf Blitzer.

I suppose it's like eating ice cream every single day for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Eventually you'll get sick of it.

Is Twitter just another place to complain?

A couple of weeks ago my wife and I bought a washer and dryer from Lowe's and scheduled an early-morning delivery so I could supervise the installation -- and make sure the delivery guys didn't track mud through the house -- before I took my daughter to daycare.

They called the day before to tell me they had to be at my house before seven because they were due at the store -- which is 15 minutes from my house -- by eight.

Perfect.

But when 7:30 rolled around and they still weren't there, I started to get annoyed. My annoyance increased threefold (at least) when I called the driver and he explained they were 20 minutes away because of truck issues.

I can be pretty forgiving, but I don't think a phone call was asking too much.

They finally showed up 45 minutes late, which pushed back my schedule by 45 minutes.

Rather than call his supervisor to complain, I turned to Twitter to voice my disapproval. The allure of the hashtag-tagged complaint held too much power. Even though my 140 character beef was met with Twilence, other consumers have been successful, turning Twitter into another hotline for customer gripes about their cable companies and commercial airlines.

And maybe to the general public, that's all it is?

What can David Gray teach us about writing?

Photo courtesy of Jason Tang.

In March of 2002, my then-girlfriend -- who was away at school while I was toiling away at my first entry-level job -- used to send me links to songs by an unfamiliar British musician named David Gray during nightly marathon instant messenger sessions.

As a rule, I didn't own any albums by emotive singer-songwriters. But as we wore out the keys on our keyboards, I was inextricably drawn to the words this singer from Liverpool put to music, and I found myself nodding in understanding at the tinny music emanating from my crappy computer speakers. 

While my girlfriend and I talked about anything and everything under the sun (or, in this case, the moon) Gray's music found a frequent spot in my playlist and eventually became the soundtrack for our relationship.

We broke up three months later.

But like that glorious, heady high smokers get when they take that first drag in the morning, I had no plans to give up the feeling I got when I listened to his music, so I fed the addiction instead of dealing with nasty withdrawals.

Today, he is still one of the handful of musicians whose new albums I buy without hesitation. And, like his music, I like to think I have matured in the last seven years. Now I have a deeper admiration for his ability to say what he wants to say without purposely convoluting the meaning to sound smarter.

While listening to his new album a few nights ago, I realized his music exemplifies everything a writer should be. And since I struggle with my writing, I thought this could be beneficial to anyone who uses words to make a living or bare their soul.

1. Be passionate. Your audience can tell when you phone it in. If you're not writing about something that stirs your very soul, it's going to come out in your words. Unless you are paid well to write refrigerator manuals, find a topic that brings out your best and write like there's no tomorrow. Your audience will come back for more.

2. Don't be afraid. Take a chance. Take an idea that is so far out of left field you're sitting in the bleachers, and devote some time to it. You might be surprised with the outcome, and find a new perspective in the process.

3. Be emotional. My favorite aspect of David Gray's music is the amount of sheer emotion he puts out. You can tell the subject matter of his songs is personal, and it comes out when he's on stage screaming and sweating and putting his all into his performance. If you can draw the reader in to your experience, you've captured one mind.

4. Be personal. I would be shocked if there isn't something in David Gray's past that informs 90 percent of his tunes. Whether it be a lost love or a long goodbye, he's drawing on it when he sings. Your upbringing and life experiences will try to sneak into your writing. Let it. That's what makes us who we are, so why should your writing lack your personality?

5. Give it your all. I know you can say this relates to all four ideas, but it does stand alone. When you're writing something -- whether it's a bylined article, blog post, or personal journal entry -- don't hold anything back. Writing allows us to express ourselves; our very livelihood hinges on the written word. Why would you waste it?